Pablo García-Berdoy, Permanent Representative of Spain to the European Union, receives the Board of Directos of the Chamber

On February 17th , the Board of Directors of the Chamber met in Brussels with the new Ambassador Pablo García-Berdoy, the Permanent Representative of Spain to the European Union.

The President, along with the Vice-President in Belgium and the Secretary General of the institution, presented to the Ambassador the activity that the Chamber carries out and the services it provides to Spanish companies within the framework of the European institutions.

The new Ambassador expressed great interest in the work of the House and expressed its intention to continue with the close cooperation that the Chamber has with REPER.

The Chamber’s Yearbooks 2017 are already available

The Official Spanish Chamber of Commerce of Spain in Belgium and Luxembourg already has its Yearbooks 2017.
We encourage you to pick up your copy at our Brussels headquarters and the Luxembourg delegation.
The yearbook includes a detailed description of the services that the Chamber offers to its members, the activity report of 2016 and a directory of members by activity sector.
From the Chamber, we want to thank the support of all the associated companies, which allow us to continue improving and responding to the needs of our members.
Likewise, we would like to thank the advertisers for their collaboration in the Yearbook 2017, which allows us to finance this publication:

air-europa Impression bove_montero_02 gutierrez
ing3 invest la-buena-vida LXT_logo_blanc
fb_image yus

To view and download our Yearbook 2017 click here.

Workshop on the VAT on intra-community and e-commerce operations

On  February 16th, the Chamber, in collaboration with its member Spanish VAT Services, organized a conference on the “VAT on intra-community and e-commerce operations”. The event gathered representatives of different Spanish and Belgian companies, members of the Chamber, representatives of European institutions and Spanish regional delegations.

The speaker of the conference DSC_0127Fernando Matesanz, Managing Director of Spanish VAT Services, who began his speech thanking the participation of the attendees and the Chamber for the organization of the event.

To begin with, Matesanz gave a brief introduction on intra EU supplies of goods. To do this, he provided examples of possible transactions between European countries (such as Belgium and Spain), specifying in which cases it would be necessary to include the Value Added Tax (VAT), and where it should be charged.

Regarding EU supply of goods, the speaker underlined the importance of Article 44 of the European VAT Directive. As a synthesis, he proposed three keys that every service provider should consider: if the recipient of the service is a taxable person, if the taxable person acts as such and where the recipient is established. For each case, there are different conditions and standards, for which Matesanz addressed the possible situations to which the companies are exposed and how to manage them.

Subsequently, Matesanz briefly mentioned the characteristics of non-EU trade between EU countries and countries that are not part of the European Union, which are exempted from this type of tax.

To conclude, the speaker remarked the importance of e-commerce nowadays, given the high number of transactions that are carried out through the Internet daily. For this reason, he dedicated a section of the speech to differentiate between B2B e-commerce goods transactions (which work in the same way as EU supply of goods) and B2C goods transactions, more typical of Internet sales, in which companies must take the VAT into account in all coDSC_0097untries including the transaction.

The future of e-commerce services transactions generated a space for debate on two issues raised by the speaker: the introduction of the MOSS system as a new tax regime for electronic commerce and the management of transactions with the UK after the Brexit, as it will be out of the EU’s transactional framework.

Matesanz encouraged the intervention of the participants, who raised specific doubts regarding the scope of the VAT Directive, changes in the interpretation of legislation and specific cases of transactions between countries inside and outside the European Union. The Managing Director of Spanish VAT Services answered each of the issues and concluded by emphasizing the importance of the correct application of VAT rates in each case, exemplifying it with three cases in which the price was exactly the same, varying the percentage corresponding to the supplier.

The new Ambassador of Spain in Belgium receives the Board of Directors of the Chamber

Cecilia Yuste Rojas, recently named Ambassador of Spain Belgium, received on 2nd February a large representation of the Board of Directors of the Official Chamber of Commerce of Spain in Belgium and Luxembourg, headed by its President and accompanied by the Chief Counsel of The Economic and Commercial Office and the General Secretary of the institution.

The new ambassador showed great interest in the work of the Chamber. Cecilia Yuste assured her personal support and proposed a close collaboration with the different ministries.

The Ambassador expressed her satisfaction with her title “ad honorem” as President of Honor of our entity.

The Board of Directors appreciated the willingness of the Ambassador.

The Official Spanish Chamber of Commerce in Belgium and Luxembourg awards its Company of the Year Prize 2016 to everis

On February 1st, 2017, the Official Spanish Chamber of Commerce in Belgium and Luxembourg awarded everis, in its fourth edition, the “Company of the Year” award 2016. Through this prize, the Chamber annually awards the promotion of commerce and Spanish business development in Belgium and Luxembourg.

The award was given at an event organized by everis with the collaboration of the Chamber, attended by such figures as Alexander De Croo, Belgian Deputy Prime Minister, Cecilia Yuste Rojas, Spanish Ambassador in Belgium, Miguel Aguirre de Cárcer, Ambassador Permanent Representative of Spain in NATO, members of the Chamber, business executives, members of the Spanish and international diplomatic corps, as well as representatives of European institutions.

Everis is a company of the NTT DATA group that offers business solutions, strategy, development and maintenance of technological applications and outsourcing. The company, which operates in the telecommunications, financial, industry, utilities, energy, public administration and healthcare sectors, achieved a turnover of 816 million euros in the last fiscal year. Nowadays, it has more than 17,000 professielsblatononals distributed in its offices and centers of high performance in 15 different countries.

The Catalan technology consultant lands in Belgium in 2011 with only two people. Five years later, everis has grown steadily, reaching 39 million in the 2016 financial year. Its accelerated growth in staff (expected to reach 450 people working on its projects by March) has led to the relocation of its Belgian headquarters to their new offices.

As part of the inauguration of its new headquarters in Brussels, an event was held in which attendees could tour the new offices, meet their employee-robot Pepper (with whom they could interact and take photographs) and live different demos of some of the activities carried out by the company.

Later, Els Blaton, CEO of the company in Belgium, gave a welcome speech to all attendees, in which she thanked their presence and reviewed the results obtained by everis Belgium in these five years.

She underlined that she feels “proud of the group for three specific reasons: the culture of the company, the results obtained and their showing of talent, creativity and innovation.” In addition, she wanted to highlight the diversity of her workforce of 28 different nationalities and gender equality, reaching almost 50%.

decrooNext, Alexander de Croo, Belgian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Development Cooperation, Digital Agenda, Telecommunications and Post Office, made a pro-digital exhibition focusing on the importance of technology in people’s lives.

De Croo pointed out the need for political forces to foster the flow of information that could benefit citizens, as well as the importance of investing in education: “the real infrastructure of today are human beings.”

Following the intervention of De Croo, the President of the Chamber, Juan Rodríguez-Villa with Ambassador Cecilia Yuste awarded the “Company of the Year” prize 2016 to Óscar Abril, Managing Partner at everis BeNeLux. Rodríguez-Villa acknowledged the role of everis in Belgium and expressed the Chamber’s commitment to support the establishment of Spanish companies in Belux.

abrilÓscar Abril was excited about the prize: “this award means a lot to us. We celebrate success and growth, our relocation to these offices and our establishment in the Netherlands.”

Making a synthesis of their trajectory in Belgian territory, the difficulties and the good results obtained, Abril concluded “of what I am most proud of is the team and its evolution. We have good people who share the everis values and ambitions. ”

After the intervention of Abril, Marc Alba, father of robot Pepper, made an exhibition in which he explained the benefits of technology combined with human capital within the company.

Finally, all the attendees enjoyed a cocktail to celebrate the anniversary of everis, the inauguration of their new offices in Brussels and the award given by the Chamber.

 

 

[AFG_gallery id=’48’]